Following Microsoft’s massive layoffs, Bethesda has been clearly asked to be a little more active in communicating exactly what it has in the works. Spot a big blog post announcing that Fallout 5 is in pre-production alongside the studio’s main focus, The Elder Scrolls 6, with both being assembled on a version of the Creation Engine set up after Starfield’s launch. It was also confirmed that remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas would be on the way, but with no concrete release date as of yet.
Bethesda reviewed all of these plans in a blog post all about what people can expect from them “in the years to come”.
“Our teams are currently developing The Elder Scrolls VI and Fallout 5 on Creation Engine 3, a shared technology platform we’ve been building since the launch of Starfield,” reads the most eye-catching section of the post. “This allows our teams to support multiple projects simultaneously with new tools, renderers, and systems that define our games. Fallout 5 is currently in pre-production. The Elder Scrolls VI is our primary development focus today, with the majority of our team currently working on the next chapter of the franchise… We are where we planned to be, we love the way it looks and play it every day.”
Meanwhile, in a section dedicated to Fallout, Bethesda confirmed that remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are in the works – the former was previously revealed via a release schedule document leaked during Microsoft’s legal battle with the FTC over their deal with Activision Blizzard – alongside the “new Fallout project” they are collaborating on with New Vegas developers Obsidian. Fallout 76 will also receive a major expansion next year called Raven Rock, which will tell “a prequel story to Fallout 3.”
Regarding Elder Scrolls, the post states that “ZeniMax Online Studios will partner closely with Bethesda Game Studios on The Elder Scrolls franchise, while continuing to deliver incredible new experiences for The Elder Scrolls Online.” Oh, and Starfield will receive “new stories, targeted gameplay improvements, and additional updates,” as well as new Starborn-focused items next year.
Overall, the studio said it was “investing deeper in the worlds players love, giving creators a bigger role in shaping their experiences and bringing our teams closer together so we can get our games into your hands sooner, support them longer, and continue building them alongside you for decades to come.” They also confirmed that they would not be making any announcements on October 23rd of this year, which is when they began airing an “annual Fallout Day broadcast”, similar to BioWare’s N7 Day thank you for Mass Effect. Instead, Todd and his colleagues are “already planning something special for Fallout’s 30th anniversary in 2027, when Fallout Day will be celebrated live in Washington, DC.” Oh god, please, no Trump in a vault suit.
Overall this is a very busy article in terms of help, a lot of my colleagues have just been laid off and now there is an executive holding a gun to my head and asking me what I’m working on. I really hope that developers who are currently left to pick up the pieces from Microsoft’s annual bloodshed aren’t pushed to overextend themselves in order to make it seem like the company’s new regime is on the right track in its change of goals, but I imagine that’s exactly what’s happening. Additionally, a Microsoft obligatory may be stuffed due to its reported Israeli military connections.
